Stewart sends message following race at Talladega

Sunday

May 6, 2012 at 8:50 PMMay 6, 2012 at 8:51 PM

TALLADEGA — Tony Stewart delivered a tongue-in-cheek message to fans who had been clamoring for some bang-’em-up wrecks.

By JOHN ZENORAssociated Press

TALLADEGA — Tony Stewart delivered a tongue-in-cheek message to fans who had been clamoring for some bang-’em-up wrecks.Happy now?“Honestly, I think if we haven’t crashed at least 50 percent of the field by the end of the race, we need to extend the race until we crash at least 50 percent of the cars,” Stewart said after Sunday’s race at Talladega Superspeedway. “It’s not fair to these fans to see any more wrecks than that, any more torn-up cars. I mean, we still had over half the cars running at the end, and it shouldn’t be that way.”Barely over half. Ten drivers were knocked out by accidents, including a nine-car pileup Sunday that swept up Stewart with four laps to go and brought out the yellow flag.Add on the mechanical problems, and only 23 of the 43 drivers managed to stay on the track for the entire 194 laps in a race won by Brad Keselowski.So much for that month-long stretch of caution-free — boring? — racing. The Sprint Cup Series hadn’t had a multi-car crash since Martinsville Speedway, five races ago. The last six had been uncharacteristically clean with few yellow flags.Talladega took care of that, with five cautions for a total of 24 laps. And Stewart made his point, too.“I’m upset that we didn’t crash more cars,” said Stewart, who finished 24th. “That’s what we’re here for. I feel bad if I don’t spend at least $150,000 in torn-up race cars going back to the shop. We’ve definitely got to do a better job at that.”Juan Pablo Montoya was knocked out earlier, and didn’t bother with any tongue-in-cheek assessments.“It’s Talladega, you know,” Montoya said. “Some people call that exciting. I don’t. It sucks. We were running a smart race. Somebody runs out of gas, somebody hit him and threw him right into us.”Keselowski said some races are more like chess matches, with strategy and smart moves playing the big roles. Some, he said, require the drivers to be more like daredevils.Guess which driving style gets the biggest rise from the announced crowd of 108,500 in Talladega?“When we come here, we’re probably more daredevils,” Keselowski said. “You hope that you split the middle of the two, and that’s what racing is.“Chess matches aren’t on TV and not a lot of people watch them and they sure as hell don’t get 100,000 people to come to the track or the match. I’ll live with that.”

FRUSTRATED GORDON: Jeff Gordon thought he had driven safely away from another late-race, nine-car pileup. Then he got clipped and found himself surging up the track to smash into the wall 142 laps in.It’s that kind of season for Gordon, who started on the pole and wound up watching the finish on TV.“I thought I was in the clear,” he said. “I was on the bottom just kind of cruising by, then all of a sudden got nailed in the door. Somebody hit somebody and knocked them into us. That’s just the way this season’s been going for us. I want to laugh at it, but I want to cry, too. “It’s just ridiculous that we cannot catch a single break. And they’re bringing these unbelievable race cars to the track.”The misfortune dropped Gordon from the top 20 in the points standings to No. 23. It also left him bemused, as well as disappointed.Gordon, a four-time series champion with six Talladega wins, called it “one of the most bizarre years” his team has been through.“At this point, we just have to kind of smile and laugh about it and find it comical and go onto the next race and try to win,” he said. “That’s all we can do.”The crash also knocked Carl Edwards, Dave Blaney, Landon Cassill and Montoya from the race.

DANICA DISCUSSION: NASCAR officials likely will speak to Danica Patrick next week about her incident with Sam Hornish Jr. after the Nationwide Series race at Talladega.Patrick intentionally wrecked Hornish on the cool-down lap of Saturday’s race. She was upset that Hornish had run her up the track on the last lap of the race.The incident was unusual for those two drivers, who raced against each other for years in IndyCar and by all accounts seemed to have a good relationship. But Hornish angrily confronted Patrick after the race. “I’m mad to get wrecked after the race,” said Hornish, who said his right front tire went down on the last lap.“I couldn’t turn and couldn’t keep it down (off Patrick). And then (Patrick) decided to turn me after the race was over into the wall. So you’ll have that.”Patrick said Hornish apologized for running her up the track. “He just came across the track and that’s all I know,” Patrick said. “I’m not really sure what happened. I’ve known Sam for a really long time and I know what to be ready for around him and I don’t know what happened.”NASCAR did not summon either driver after the race for a discussion, but officials said they’ll likely speak to Patrick next week at Darlington.

ENGINE TROUBLES: Jimmie Johnson had another big-time, big-track disappointment.Engine troubles knocked the five-time NASCAR champion from contention for a repeat victory on lap No. 62 after he had moved from 19th to the front of the pack.“We were up there leading the race,” said Johnson, who led five laps but had to settle for 35th. “I’m all excited, then I smelled a little oil and I’m like, ‘Man, this is leaking oil.’ I looked in the mirror and I was smoking. I was, ‘Oh, it’s me.’“It’s disappointing, but there’s not much you can do.”He still made it deeper into the race than he did at the Daytona 500, when Johnson wrecked on the second lap after getting nudged from behind by Elliott Sadler. He finished 42nd.This was another setback out of his control, but Johnson was philosophical about the disappointment that dropped him two spots to No. 8 in the points standings.“It hurts when you’re up there leading the race,” he said. “I led for a while before we had the issue, but we don’t have many parts failures. It’s just the way it is. I’d rather take it now early in the season and hopefully learn something for the next big track. Our car was super-fast. We started 19th and got up there in the lead.”Two other Chevrolet drivers had left earlier with engine failure. Ryan Newman made it to the 43rd lap, while Regan Smith had problems on No. 15.

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